09 October 2018

As a growing number of organizations propose satellites to monitor greenhouse gases, national space agencies who already operate such spacecraft welcome those new entrants — as long as they're willing to share their results.

Missions to track emissions of such gases by human activities, once solely in the realm of major space agencies, are now being considered by state governments, non-profit organizations and companies, seeking to leverage advances in small satellites to fill perceived gaps in what data is already available.

Image credit: NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory - Spacecraft by national space agencies to study greenhouse gases, like NASA's OCO-2, are being joined by satellites proposed by companies, non-profit organizations and even the state of California.